What if there was no Easter - II: Concluding Message from Pastor Rajiv

(Contd.)

Why did Paul address this question with such urgency and you can hear that urgency in his words.

It was because some false teachers in Corinth were preaching that there was no resurrection of the dead. They were of the view that once you die that was the end. The reason for this line of thinking is that some people treat god’s word arbitrarily. They take parts that they like and reject others that they don’t. And mind you some preachers do that even today.

But if God’s word is the authority then all of it must believed even if there are some parts which may be difficult to understand. 

Paul’s message to the Corinthians and to us is that to deny our own resurrection is to deny Christ’s rising from the dead.  And denying the resurrection of Christ destroys the very essence of the Christian faith which is eternal life through the risen and ever-living Jesus Christ.

In verses 14 to 18 Paul makes 4 very crucial points.

A. Denial of the resurrection destroys the essence of the Christian message and the validity of the reality of faith.

B. It also brings into question the truthfulness of Paul and the other apostles preaching the resurrected Christ.

C. Denial of the resurrection also questions the forgiveness of sins and the assurance of eternal life.


Dr. David Jeremiah in the Jeremiah study bible puts it this way.

Paul says the resurrection is not merely a doctrine for the future it affects how Christians live in the present. If the message of Christ is for this life only à then life has no purpose.

You know come to think of it ‘what if there was no Easter is not really a hypothetical question. 
It is a very critically relevant question and this passage is a very elaborate answer to that question. If there was no Easter we would be living carrying the burden of our sins on ourselves.

If there was no Easter we would be living without any hope for the future.

If there was no Easter the word of God would be irrelevant.

Because, there is an Easter we worship the risen living Christ our sins are forgiven as he paid the price with his death.

Because there is an Easter we have the hope of eternal life because Christ lives we will live with him eternally.

And we celebrate and worship our risen lord not just on resurrection Sunday but on every Sunday.

What if there was no Easter: Pastor Rajiv's Mid Week Message

Bible Reading 1 Corinthians 15 verses 12 to 22

If you like to listen to politicians and world leader interviews the journalist interviewing the leader will sometimes ask the leader a question around what he or she would do if faced with a certain situation.

The political leader in most cases dismisses the question with this response ‘that is a hypothetical question and I do not want to answer it’.

That is because the politician does not want to be led into making a public statement that could hold him or her accountable in the future.

But today we are going to consider and seek answers to a hypothetical question a question that is extremely critical to our Christian faith.

Last Sunday we celebrated Easter which is also resurrection Sunday. We celebrate the rising of our Lord from the dead never ever to die again.

The question is:  what if there was no Easter? What if there were no resurrection? 

Most people would refuse to consider that possibility and like the politician, put it down as a hypothetical question.

But even though it may be a hypothetical question it is a question that must be considered and the answers contemplated, because if there were no Easter, we, you and I, will be irrelevant!

This question is critical and was important enough for Paul to have addressed it in our bible passage today.

what if there was no Easter? Where would we be today? What hope would we have had for our own future? If there was no Easter would not the entire word of God be irrelevant? Would not our own faith be in vain?

All these questions may very well be hypothetical, but they are extremely critical for our faith and, most of all, our hope.

So let us look carefully at how Paul dealt with this question in these eleven verses, over the next two days.

God Bless you. 

The Hypocritical Tree

The word hypocrite comes from a Greek word that means “play actor.” A hypocrite is someone pretending to be something that he or she is not in order to receive recognition or gain.

Matthew 21 18 and 19

18 Early in the morning, as Jesus was on his way back to the city, he was hungry. 19 Seeing a fig tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never bear fruit again!” Immediately the tree withered.

This passage is a shocker! To anyone who reads the Bible, Jesus, son of God comes across as a meek, non-aggressive, unselfish person who would not be harsh to anyone, especially if they showed harshness to them. After all he said blessed are the meek. That same person who, when beaten, humiliated and crucified did not react and in fact prayed for the forgiveness of His torturers and murderers. Now how is it that such a person curses a tree, simply because He was hungry and the tree had not produced fruit, though it had a foliage of leaves and seemed perfectly healthy? And curses it to the death?

Well for one thing we see a human side where He was hungry, got misled by the trees health into thinking He would be able to eat some fruit, and got angry or maybe frustrated when He could not. On the spiritual side we see an inverted miracle.

We see precisely, the stakes not only of failing to produce fruit, but of giving a fruitful impression and failing to back it up, popularly called "hypocritical". 

Thus, it is with us: as followers if we do not produce the expected fruit, but only a show of it, we will bear the outcome of such a hypocrisy just as the scribes did.

Jesus condemns hypocrites (as He did the tree). Read Matthew chapter 33 to understand the damning result of being a hypocrite. All in all, it's a very serious offence: 

Hypocrisy deceives the hypocrite, damages unbelievers, and dishonors God. The Biblical yardstick is to judge others, not the hypocrite himself. While we are all guilty of this at times, one must recognize it's seriousness as a fault and consciously overcome it as a weakness to be overcome. 

“Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy." Luke 12:1